Top 5 England cricketers who never played the Cricket World Cup

#4 Owais Shah

Shah's performances deteriorated at the wrong time

Owais Shah's ODI career began in 2001 and ended in 2009. However, his appearances during this period were not very consistent. He began his ODI career decently, scoring a half-century in his second ODI against Pakistan at Lord’s.

He made sporadic appearances for the team until January 2003 before being dropped from the team. He did not find a place in the squad for the 2003 World Cup. By that time, he scored only 283 runs from 15 innings at an average of 21.76 with two fifties to his name.

He returned to the national team in 2006 due to many first team members sustaining injuries. However, he scored a combined 11 runs in three innings and would not feature in the ODI team until the series against India. He thus missed out on a place in the 2007 World Cup.

Shah produced some really wonderful performances from 2007-2009 including a century against India and a match-winning knock of 98 against South Africa during the 2009 Champions Trophy. However, his poor performances in the ODI series against Australia before the Champions Trophy put his place in the national team in jeopardy. He was not chosen in the Tour of South Africa and with Middlesex not renewing his contract at the end of the 2010 season, Shah’s chances of entering the national team and even the slightest chance of securing a place in the 2011 World Cup were put paid to.

Shah’s ODI career ended with 1834 runs at an average of 30.56 with 12 fifties and a hundred to his name.